69 Comments

By the way I should also add that I emailed this piece to Robin.

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Has he replied yet?

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The interesting thing about the Gervis furore is that TRA seem to be the only group to be offended by his material. Where are the disability groups complaining? The womens groups? Chinese people? Every one else's seems to be able to have a bit of a laugh about themselves. They know what they he is saying isn't true. Its funny. But it's slightly different when it comes to cracking trans jokes because it IS the truth and the truth hurts them.

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Very true, don't see a host of female comedian led by an angry Miranda Harte screaming that his comments about them were literal violence.

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And because it's mainly about white, able bodied middle-class men looking for victimhood because they've had enough of being told they control the world which, let's be honest, many do.

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Everyone else knows what a joke is and understands that a comedian like Ricky Gervais is a decent person who is not out to hurt people but to make them think. The fragility of these men is such that their radars are constantly sweeping for any signal that might 'invalidate' them.

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Exactly Jemima. Ricky is literally arguing the TRA side. Why are they so outraged, they should be applauding RG for getting the message out

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Yes! From one angle you could argue that he's just used his platform to conduct the biggest personality disorder test in history. Narcissists cannot laugh at themselves because it hurts them too much, and with a few mild jokes he has baited them and their handmaidens into publicly identifying themselves.

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Someday, the "Trans Day of Remembrance" will mean the day we recollect the names of particularly egregious apologists and attack dogs for the aggressive, fetish-promoting, misogynist, homophobic, child-endangering totalitarian gender identity movement.

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Or the victims of people claiming they are trans but carrying out crimes with the tools of the sex they actually are.

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It would be awful if lots of people copied that text and all went over to Ince's substack and pasted it in his comments section, verbatim. I definitely wouldn't encourage such an act.

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Nor me. It would in no way be something I would endorse either.

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That would explain why the comments have been turned off 😂

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Shame...!

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What a truly excellent response. Such a shame it was removed.

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Maybe Ince should explain his claim that anti-trans punchlines "seem to have become highly profitable" despite the "dehumanising effect on a swathe of marginalised people". What about the performers and others who work in comedy, who're aware that if they utter a fucking word that's seized upon as transphobic it could be career ending for them? What about the women who aren't just being marginalised and oppressed, they're being put in danger, including by changes to laws designed to protect them? This prick makes it very clear which group he places value on. There are no punchlines, just a punch in the guts for women.

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I am so fed up with these creepy old blokes who want men in with my teenage grand daughters.

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I missed his comment. The TRAs have been posting James acaster and Nish Kumar ranting about Ricky - jealously is a very potent brew. Neither Nish nor James are funny. They are virtue signalling woke blokes with zero real interest in anything but themselves. Ricky is actually one of the most intelligent comedians- the joke is rooted in stupidity not in the people themselves but the stupidity they display. No one is above his lampooning from Hitler (give Hitler his due (spelt due) to fat people to gingers to women. As a chunky red headed woman of Jewish heritage I laughed like a loon. His show was fantastic. I didn’t troll him on fritter - I was too busy giggling and whooping.

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I caught bits of Acaster's rant. Nothing witty, just completely deranged. He was almost foaming at the mouth. I had to turn off as it gave me a headache.

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Another formerly admired comic with feet of clay. An advocate of critical scientific reasoning, to boot. Great response.

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Not just any rapist, but the words of an incestuous rapist!

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To be fair, not the words *of* the incestuous rapist but of someone supporting him

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Well, if we're going to quibble...

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😊... TBH (and yes his acts are disgusting and in no way do I condone them or am I trying to excuse them), Chris Chan sounds like a really sad individual who has been bullied and exploited. Again, not trying to excuse him in any way. But in some ways he also seems like a victim. At the very least he is what you could call a vulnerable adult.

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'HER' penis, is said almost daily by TRA's. Not just about Chris Chan.

It is almost as ridiculous, and offensive as 'girldick' or 'ladydick'.

The latest I've heard is 'gock' shortened from girlcock

I don't know how they can say 'women who have penises' with a straight face, TBH

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I can't figure-out why Robin Incel decided to write his piece. Why do it? What did he have to gain? Whilst he has decided that a critique of his work is just too much to bear, his Twitter feed is a car crash. Twitters algorithms initially give the impression that his view is supported, but scroll down and he his spanked with a ratio that even Grace Lavery would have been pushed to match.

And there are some gems in the Replies, such as one from 'Shatterface', who I hope won't be offended if I reprint it;

'If you think that that gender is innate, that giving puberty blockers to gay or autistic children is safe, and that males have no biological sporting advantage over women, why don’t you do an Infinite Monkey Cage on it and explain the “science”?'

Robin seems unwilling to research the subject, and indeed many replies implore him to do just that. Yet his bigotry leaves him seriously vulnerable to the charge that he doesn't rightly get 'science'.

Perhaps he thinks he is being 'nice' but not even recognising that Ricky was quoting the actual words of transactivists leaves the impression that perhaps Prof. Brian Cox would be best advised to stay away from someone who simply doesn't put in the effort to understand a subject.

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Why? Something... something.... signalling...

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I've always found Robin Ince intensely irritating always upstaging and trying so hard to appear to be so clever. Toe curling. His overtalking on Infinite monkey cage made it almost unlistenable...SO my instincts were right. He is a twat.

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I cannot like this enough. Just reading a book on free speech. It talks about being able to voice critism being in everyone's favour. About self censorship stifling creativity.

About safetyism.

About hyperbole

About the overuse of "fascist"

It all resonates.

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I'll use the word fascist when referring to people who wear swastikas and the idiots who support them!

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Ricky is being treated as a blasphemer. His likeness will be hung from a lamppost , as the suffragette flag is burned and stomped-on in the streets.

We've seen this with other religions, of course.

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Not that many other religions

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I’m afraid I didn’t quite make it all the way through his article, but he seemed to be saying he was only going to write jokes that don’t involve any offense from now on.

That’s quite a challenge.

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And he wants his act to be 'inclusive'. *shudders*

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Oh, I know. I’ve been watching clips of W1A recently on YouTube, and ‘inclusive’ comes up a lot. It’s so weird that the BBC made that comedy. Was it a warning of what was to come?

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Forgive me, as a non-TV watcher - generally speaking - I do not know what 'W1A' is?

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It’s the postcode of the London BBC building, it was a comedy about inept people doing jobs they weren’t capable of doing, having endless meetings in which they talked a lot of nonsensical jargon and never got anything done. If you can, take a look at the clips. There was another series called Twenty Twelve, same sort of thing, but the vague goal was to come up with an Olympic Games legacy. A lot of talk about ‘sustainability’ and other buzzwords.

I think it’s called lampooning isn’t it? I’m not sure.

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AH I see! Well, thank you for taking the trouble to give me the information, I appreciate that. I will have a look!

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I’m actually going to buy the dvd. I remember laughing so much it hurt 😁

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Or maybe just warning us of what was actually happening at the BBC.

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And I find his intentions highly, perpetually offensive. How dare he! What a muppet. Knotted himself into a teeny weeny knot in a corner.

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Well, indeed. My guess is, it doesn’t matter if you offend a ‘TERF’.

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Bloody well said Stuart Campbell. You've reminded me just why I feel so passionately about this issue.

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